Skip to main content 
By STEVE MASCORD
BEFOREHAND, it had all the hallmarks of a car crash – with KISS’ most gullible fans shaping as willing victims.
The glam icons supposedly played their last ever show on December 2 2023 at Madison Square Garden, selling their catalogue to Swedish company Pophouse for $300 million and announcing they would be replaced by avatars. Then, in March this year, an event call “KISS Army Storms Vegas” was announced.
Interest was lukewarm. We weren’t even sure if the band would perform. We weren’t sure who would be in the band. It was billed as a tribute to the KISS Army in its 50th year but even some hardcore fans were underwhelmed.
The concept, a convention at Las Vegas’ Virgin Hotel, seemed badly in need of an overhaul and that’s what it got. It was rebranded to tie in with the KISS Kruise, an event that has been held on the Caribbean intermittantly since 2011, drummer Eric Singer belatedly signed on and it happened last weekend.
By some standards, KISS botched their final show with no guest appearances, no acknowledgement of past members, no changes to their garden variety setlist. And if you stuff up your farewell, you stuff up your legacy. Could an 11th-hour makeover make a difference – and could KISS even achieve such a thing?
Acoustic set
KISS played outdoors, sort-of reprising their 1995 MTV Unplugged TV special. It was set down for 2.45pm to 4pm local time and the social media content pumped out by the attendees gave the rest of the world the idea this may not be a bad event to be, at after all. Electric candles were handed out before the show and Paul Stanley asked the crowd to “think about somebody who is at the foundation of this band. We’re talking about Ace (Frehley). We certainly had differences, but that’s what family is about. Why don’t we take a moment… think about him looking down on us – from Jendell, probably – and let’s have a moment for Ace.” Frehley, the original guitarist in KISS, died on October 16 at the age of 74; his shadow would be large over the course of this weekend. There appeared to have been little in the way of rehearsals for the unplugged set; Stanley warned ‘this may suck’. But the consensus was that it did not. Setlist: “Comin’ Home”, “See You Tonite”, “A World Without Heroes”, “Hard Luck Woman”, “Christine Sixteen”, “Nothin’ to Lose”, “Goin’ Blind”, “Hide Your Heart”, “Plaster Caster”, “Beth”, “Love Her All I Can”.
Future of KISS
DAY two started with two panel discussions that were in direct competition at the same time: The KISS Army Founders Panel and the KISS Army ’Toys and Comics That Made KISS”. But later in the day was a big one: The Future Of KISS panel with manager Doc McGee. Johan Lagerlöf of Pophouse, the company that bought the KISS catalogue, joined McGhee in one of the hotel function rooms and there were three broad aspects discussed. One: The KISS Avatars. Two: The KISS movie. Three: An upcoming documentary. Thierry Coup is the creative director of the avatar show, which is intended to resemble the successful ABBA installation in London that Pophouse also runs (in fact, Björn Ulvaeus is a founder of the company) “When we did the MSG moment at the end, it was really to spark the idea of what was going to come in the future, and to really tell everyone that KISS is only done with the first chapter — the first 50 years,” Coup told attendees. “The next 50 years is about to start. Now, we’re right in the middle of developing the real avatar [show], which takes about two years. We are developing the stage and taking this energy and this incredible KISS explosive theatrics and shows into the future. Many, many years ago, what blew me away was when I went to my first KISS concert. It just changed my life. I knew KISS’s music, but you don’t know KISS until you see them live. It took me into their world… For me, to be lucky enough to be involved with creating this avatar show, it’s like a dream come true. When Pophouse came along a couple of years ago asking me ‘do you want to create the biggest, most incredible tour in the world and blow it up with pyrotechnics?’ Yeah, of course — I’m in. Count me in… The past 30 years, I’ve been creating big, crazy, immersive shows [and] multimedia shows. If you’ve flown with Harry Potter or ridden with Mario in his Mario Kart or been chased by a dinosaur at Universal, I was probably involved with that. For me to be asked to do this, it’s fantastic. I love KISS, I love KISS’s music. I think there’s no better band to really go into the future like this and keep inspiring new fans.” The latest concept art was show at the seminar but fans were asked not to share photos. Mark Canton is the director of the biopic, which will be called Shout It Out Loud. He said he was still working on finding the right actors. “KISS is the most exciting band in rock and roll history. We owe the Army the most exciting movie in history. More than any other band in the history of rock and roll, there is rock and roll before KISS and then there is rock and roll after KISS.” The director is McG; he said: “My goal is to give everybody something you can go to the theatre and just have your face melted and just feel the heat coming off the stage – and for that matter, coming off the screen – which is what I get so excited about at a KISS show.” The documentary is being pieced together from thousands of hours of footage shot during the End Of The Road tour. “You’ll see a whole different side of KISS,” said McGee.”We’ve always tried to capture what we’re doing. We had to do the fly-on-the-wall [approach], because if you don’t, everybody becomes actors, and it gets boring. You have to really find a way, and the only way to do it is to have people with you that you trust that sit there and film you all day long. We did this for five years — we started this ’19 — so it was important to us to not have the usual KISS/WWE kind of thing. KISS is like WWE in a certain way — they’re always on, and all this. We wanted to catch all the moments that were inspiring, that you could see the heart of KISS. It took us a long time, and we have thousands of hours of this stuff. We’ve been editing this for two years to find the right thing, and I think we’ve got a great mix. I think when you see it, you’ll see a whole different side of KISS than what we’re used to seeing. You’ll see that tie together. I think it will be a great ride that will then bring us into the biopic and then into the avatar show. I think right now we have the tentpoles set up to set us up for the future. One thing we’ve always tried to do is, we don’t release anything until it’s right. Whether it’s the avatar show , if it takes longer, it takes longer. If this takes longer, it takes longer. If the movie takes longer… we’ve been doing this movie for seven years. We don’t need to make a movie, and we don’t need to make a documentary. We need to make a phenomenal [documentary], a phenomenal avatar show and the best movie out there, and I think we have the best team to do it.” There was another event involving guitarist Bruce Kulick, comediann Craig Gass producer Bob Ezrin (remote) and host Chris Jericho, which you can watch below.
Other bands
FIRST up was Kuarantine, wrestler Jericho’s cover band dedicated to non-makeup era KISS. The most interesting thing here is the setlist: “I Just Wanna”, “Heaven’s on Fire”, “Heart of Chrome”, “Good Girl Gone Bad”, “All Hell’s Breakin’ Loose”, “Let’s Put the X in Sex”, “Fits Like a Glove”, “Who Wants to Be Lonely”, “Domino”, “Silver Spoon”, “Creatures of the Night”, “Uh! All Night”, “Unholy”, “Turn On the Night”. Next on the Saturday night came Sebastian Bach, who included “Shock Me” in his set as a tribute to Ace. On Sunday, Bruce Kulick played a solo set – his band consisted of Todd Kerns, Joe McGinness and Brent Fitz with Eric Singer sitting in for “Domino”. Here’s the setlist: “Creatures of the Night”, “Uh! All Night”, “Who Wants to Be Lonely”, “Unholy”, “Thrills in the Night”, “Domino”, “Parasite”, “Sword and Stone”, “Larger Than Life”, “Tears Are Falling”, “King of Hearts”, “Carr Jam / Paralyzed / Tough Love / Spit”, “Forever”,”Crazy Crazy Nights / Turn On the Night”, “God Gave Rock and Roll to You”. And finally, Tommy Thayer rejoined his old band Black & Blue for their gig. Thayer came out 40 minutes into the gig and played “Chains Around Heaven”, “Autoblast”, “Hold Onto 18” and “Chains Around The King”.
Cooking with Paul Stanley
THE Starchild channeled Jamie Oliver with this event several hours before the band’s unmasked electric set. And again at the end of it, he took questions from the floor (but no food from the floor – even under the 10 second rule). On Frehley, he said: “It’s no secret — we had lots of differences with Ace, lots of differences with [original KISS drummer] Peter [Criss]. But that’s family. This whole KISS monument was built with a foundation of those guys. We couldn’t have started it without them, and we couldn’t continue it with them, but it doesn’t change. (Frehley) was so thrilled with the idea of going to the Kennedy Center… We miss him, and I hope he lived the kind of life he wanted to. He was one of a kind and he was wild, and he did say if his life ended tomorrow, he’d have no regrets because he lived the kind of life he wanted to. That’s all we can expect from any of us — when it’s over, hopefully we’ve had the kinds of lives that we wanted. That’s what I wish for all of you — just don’t go too soon.” On performing at the nearby Las Vegas Sphere: “From the time the Sphere opened, people would say to us, ‘You guys are a natural for the Sphere.’ I’m not really so sold on the idea, because KISS has always been about being larger than life, and at the Sphere, the band is on a postage stamp. For my money, I think you don’t even need a live band there. People are watching the screens, which are amazing — what’s being programmed, the content, is incredible, but I want the band to matter. You forget that there’s a band on that little stage, so I’m not really sure how we would do it.” On ‘deep cuts’: “Let’s talk about deep cuts for a minute. Deep cuts appeal to two people… I once went to see a very, very big band, and what they were advertising for this particular show was [that] they were going to play all deep cuts. It was the most boring fucking thing I’d ever seen in my life. Honestly, the reason cuts are deep is because they’re not popular, and they’re not as good. Do we take out ‘Detroit Rock City‘? Do we take out ‘Love Gun‘? Do we take out ‘God Of Thunder‘ to play some song? I don’t think you’ll be disappointed but if you’re expecting deep cuts, I’ll see you next time.” Stanley also said there would be a KISS Kruise next year.
Electric set
WE can no longer really say KISS is retired, can we? The same four guys playing a fully plugged in set before fans in Las Vegas – that is not most people’s definition of a retired musical group. Bruce Kulick joined them for “Lick It Up” and “Rock’n’Roll All Nite” (neither from his period in the band, between 1984 and 1996) and only one song was repeated from the acoustic set – “Love Her All I Can” from Dressed To Kill. “No makeup, no bombs, we’re still pretty fucking good, right?” Stanley said at one stage. The Starchild later apologised for not properly acknowledging Kulick, saying: “I just wanted to apologise to Bruce because last night with everything going on and it being exciting and it being a big adrenaline rush, first I was surprised when Bruce was out there. I didn’t remember he was coming out and then I forgot to give him his due ’cause Bruce not only is a member of the family, Bruce was an important member of the band. So, apologies for not giving him his credit last night.” Paul’s voice has not magically returned to its former glory but nor was its fragility a distraction, as it had been at times before that “retirement”. So, here’s the setlist: “Deuce”, “Take Me”, “Hotter Than Hell”, “Calling Dr. Love”, “Got to Choose”, “Watchin’ You”, “Cold Gin”, “I Love It Loud”, “Love Her All I Can” “Let Me Go, Rock ‘n’ Roll”, “Black Diamond” “Detroit Rock City”, “Shout It Out Loud”, “Do You Love Me”, “Lick It Up”, “Rock and Roll All Nite”.
Q&A session with Stanley, Simmons, Singer and Thayer.
JERICHO was the moderator as the band sat on a stage with mics, taking questions. On the possibility of KISS recording new music, Stanley said: “There may be some music in the works. We like to tell you what we’re doing, the things that are planned. The problem is that so much of what we may bring up never comes to fruition, [but] music, yeah, that looks pretty damn… more than possible. Probable. I’m not going to give you any hints, but I only write when there’s a project — and I’ve been writing.” Simmons on regrets: “If I have any regrets, it’s that I sometimes — and I think we all go through this — wish we were smarter and better at trying to help Ace and Peter have better lives. All of us are guilty of it, and so am I — ‘I don’t want to start an argument. Let’s just continue doing the tour,’ because you want to get through it for selfish reasons because it’s working and the chicks and the money and you don’t want to ruin anything. Meantime, somebody who might be your brother is ruining their life by bad decisions. I think this goes to your friends, your lovers, your family members — I wish I would have practiced more tough love and been more in the face of people that we cared about… Tough love is a good idea in my opinion with your children, with the people you love, with the people you care about, with the people you work with. It’s not going to be a popular thing — you’re going to argue about it — but in the long run, you’re going to be helping that person hopefully change their life.” KISS seem to have performed some tough love on themselves since December 2023 – Stanley made a reference to Simmons ‘schtick’ shaping his public persona. The raw emotion, integrity, poise and humanness of Ozzy Osbourne and Black Sabbath’s swansong in Birmingham cast the parallel moments in other careers into sharp relief. KISS didn’t claw back those qualities in Vegas last weekend – but they took a step in the right direction.
READ AND HEAR INTERVIEWS WITH DOZENS OF ARTISTS VIA OUR PATREON PAGE. EAVESDROP AS WE CHAT TO THE BIGGEST NAMES IN ROCK AND METAL – FROM 1987 TO THE PRESENT!
Features:
Johnny Diesel and the Injectors
Audio interviews:
-
KISS – Creatures Of The Night 5CD blue ray boxed set
$317.42 -
KISS – Destroyer 45th anniversary vinyl
$93.73 -
KISS – Alive! vinyl
$67.25 -
KISS – Off The Soundboard Live in Ploughkeepsie NY 1984
$39.98 -
KISS – “I Was Made For Loving You” music video
$2.00 -
KISS – KISS vinyl
$99.23 -
Ace Frehley solo album Japanese import CD
$610.49
